The History of the Reformation - an audio sermon series by Joe Morecraft

Quotes and comments;
- there are over 40 sermons in this excellent series. I recommend it highly.
- in my opinion a christian who doesn't know the history of christianity ever remains a child.
- there's a focus on the English Reformation; with five sermons on John Knox alone.

The Silences of God - an article by Arthur Custance

Quotes and comments;
- this is one of his 'Doorway Papers'

1. Four centuries of Silence
"Looking back upon those centuries -- which at the outset seemed to hold such promise for so many reasons but which ended up in such a sad denial of everything rewarding that life has to offer when lived as God intends it to be lived -- one cannot help but feel that this disappointing experiment was allowed to run its course while God deliberately remained silent, only that He might show once for all the inability of man to discover the meaning of life by the mere exercise of his own intellect and without the aid of revelation."
- he's referring to the 4 or 5 centuries before Christ.

How did Jesus Die? - article by Arthur Custance

Quotes and comments;
- this is one chapter' of his book The virgin birth and the Incarnation; available online.
- I found the above chapter helpful in getting an understanding of exactly how Jesus might have died. Full of interesting detail and anecdotes from his study on the subject.

The character of God - audio lecture by J. I. Packer

Quotes and comments;
- this is one of 19 lectures in systematic theology by Packer. Excellent.
- I found these lectures at Monergism.com. (The best resource for Reformed theology that I know of.)
- J. Packer was one of the first christian speakers I ever heard of. He taught a stones throw from where I live; and I used to listen to him on a local tv program. (Terry Winter)
- I haven't heard in about ten years I guess; sad to see that he's adopted the 'frame work' view of creation. (This bit of obfuscation more or less allows you to pretend you believe anything the secular community says at any point in time; as no one has a clue what you're talking about.)

Why does god allow suffering? - audio lecture by A. E. Wilder-Smith

Quotes and comments;
- scroll down the page to find lecture.

1. An engaging and thought provoking lecture. At one point W. speaks of a colleague of his who suffered from a deformity, who told him he couldn't believe in a god who'd made such a 'botch' of things.
- the most difficult of subjects for the christian to deal with, but well done. (By that I mean courageously confronted.)

Crossed Fingers: How the Liberals Captured the Presbyterian Church. A book (available free online) by Gary North

Quotes and comments;
- look under the authors section (left hand side bar)
- this is an astounding history of the 'liberal' church. It's also one of the saddest books I've ever read. To see how far the P. church has fallen (into the Humanist sewer) I offer the following quote.

1. (p/626) 'By 1991, the spiritual heirs of Machen's enemies proposed this for consideration by the 203rd General Assembly: "Young people, regardless of their sexual orientation, need to understand the institutional power of heterosexism and the injustice that it perpetuates. As the church is called to speak a truthful word about sexuality, it does so in the name of God's call to justice--a call that invites gay and lesbian adolescents to explore (57) the goodness of their sexuality within the community of God's people."
It was little more than half a century's journey from theological perversion to sexual perversion. Machen had seen it coming: "God save us from the deadly guilt of consenting to the presence as our (58) representatives in the church of those who lead Christ's little ones astray..."
- the question Machen had then (and I do now) is, why do these people call themselves christian?

A Wider case for God - Peter Williams has made this book of his available free online at his website. Look in the book section; under free books.

Quotes and comments;

1. 'Kai Nielsen has argued that: "for somebody living in the twentieth century with a good philosophical and a good scientific education, who thinks carefully about the matter. . . it is irrational to believe in God."
- I can't see that a materialist has any sound basis for calling anything irrational. Materialism is the denial of mind and therefore of reason. It's therefore intellectual fraud for materialists to call belief in god irrational. Nothing could be either rational or irrational if materialism were true.

2. 'Christian Philosophers such as Alvin Plantinga... have argued that belief in God can be ‘basic’ in the same way that trust in the general reliability of our memory and other cognitive systems is ‘basic.’
- If it's forumuated correctly I believe this argument has merit; ie. "since man is made by god to live in god's world it is reasonable to assume that if a sane person believes x to be true, there is warrant to think it actually is true."
- Richard Dawkins? has mocked this idea with one of his ridiculous examples (he's the king of bad illustrations) something like; "If I believe in pink elephants, that means they exist." (He used a more absurd example.) He utterly fails to understand the argument. (what's new?) The argument stipulates a person believe x to be true. Dawkins doesn't believe his illustration is true. He's so used to lying he apparently gets confused when asked for a true belief :-)
- the argument comes in 2 version; the generic and the christian. (I don't think the generic version works.) Certainly Dawkins has no reason to believe that even his true beliefs are valid; ie. since he believes he's an automaton being manipulated by 'selfish' genes. Of course the question with dawkins is always; "is he really this clueless or is he only pretending to be." In any event, in an intellectual debate one has a right to take people at their word. There are certain risks in adopting the rhetorical strategy of pretended ignorance. Some people think he's faking it, while I think he truly is grossly ignorant of philosophy; unable to follow simple arguments. In fact I'd say that what Richard Dawkins knows about philosoophy you could write with a crayon on the back of Paley's watch.

History of Philosophy and Christian thought - audio lecture series by Ronald Nash. Available from Biblicaltraining

Quotes and comments:
- as I remember you have to sign up to be able to access the course; but it's free.
- you'll have to endure some bad jokes (the late dr. Nash fancied himself a bit of a humorist) but this is a worthwhile introduction to the subject.